the mermaid’s voice returns in this one ( PDFDrive )

I. the sky

“ after the unimaginable happened, the mermaid left the dried up sea of her planet & rode a shooting star straight into the sky.

door sealed. television off. curtains closed. hammering heart. creaking bed. tear-filled silence. years shattered. - a little girl played hide & seek in the wrong place.

how he managed to choke me with both of his wrists ribboned together behind his back. - “do not say a word.”

there nothing i was no one i could have done. there was could have told. - a pebble i cannot get down.

what felt like hours of begging & screaming & crying & shouting “don’t you love me?” was wiped clean with a single word from your mouth. by some miracle, you convinced my mother that it was okay if i took my bike out into the rain

& rode to my heart’s content— because if anyone could be trusted to turn back from danger, it was me, - wasn’t it?

it should be safe for little girls to ride their little yellow bikes around the block without someone ending up in handcuffs. - wanted.

“call me dad,” he would tell me. i wanted so badly to tell him “no” because i already had one & he could never hope to measure up. - you weren’t family by blood or the family i chose.

when i cannot cope i erase it instead. - not a printing error.

star light, star bright, first star i see tonight; i wish i may, i wish i might flee my skin for but a night. - bibliophile.

“i wish i could be her friend,” the girl whispers down into the tear-stained pages, lovingly caressing the gold-dipped edges. “no—i’d rather be her.” - ariel.

“i wish i could be her friend,” the fictional girl echoes back. she reaches up, her hand falling back down to her side when she realizes her mistake. “no—i’d rather be her.” - ariel II.

& that’s how the girl learned how to love but only ever from a great distance.

sometimes she cannot tell the difference between the days she’s walked this earth as herself & the days she’s walked through paragraphs as someone else. - no one noticed & she liked it that way.

do you ever find yourself nostalgic for the life you never got to have? - (because i do.)

do you ever find yourself nostalgic for the person you never got to be? - (because i do II.)

whenever you need a healthy dose of serenity, crawl through the frosted windowpane of her mind. blades of grass grow in shades of paradise. opals droop from branches instead of leaves. rivers flow with undiluted rosebud water. milk&honey falls from the clouds instead of rain. even the absolutely

unthinkable happens here: children learn peacefully, unafraid of angry hands around guns. - hooks encrusted in sand.

though i tend to believe poppies probably speak in secret, i’m under no illusion that you will ever read this poem or any other. (you lie still beneath the headstone i placed my lipstick palm on.)

still, i cannot rest until i write these words down for you: i’m nobody. i’m nobody, too. - called back. (homage to the poem “I’m Nobody! Who are you?” by Emily Dickinson)

when i tell you i’m still waiting for my hogwarts letter, what i mean to say is i never meant to be here for so long. - forever wandering lost & wandless.

“maybe i’m not the book you dog-ear & keep with you always,” the girl murmured, pulling her sleeves over her hands. “maybe i’m the book you forget to bookmark & leave on the train.” - shrinking violets like us.

can’t a prince a princess a n y o n e just come along & gaze upon me with such adoration it’s as if i’m the gem of the deep, not the rubble of pompeii? - when will it be my turn?

in search of someone who made her feel like she belonged in this world, she went on countless journeys expeditions voyages. - it was always the girl through the looking glass.

she didn’t kiss frogs. she kissed great white sharks.

i find that losing yourself in love letters & white lies & time differences & dropped signals is always easier than venturing out into the unpredictable - wild.

the prince of her dreams was sipping on an old-fashioned while she popped lotus blossoms into her mouth. neither of them felt their vices were quite doing the trick, so they left them behind & ran away. it didn’t matter where they ended up, so long as it was away. so long as it was together.

happenstance 'ha-pǝn-stans noun 1: he & i. 2: me, falling down those treetop eyes. - who was i before you?

“i ought to let you know— i find my prince every year,” - i said.

“then this year— this year will be all mine,” - he replied, unfazed.

the very minute he realized he could wrap his fingers around my wrists with space left & fill in the dips between my hipbones with handfuls of stones & seashells, he made

for damn sure my plate was always overflowing. - filed under: things i hate that i owe to you.

you weren’t the first one to tell me they would kiss my scars so pretty, but you were certainly the first i believed. - now i know you can’t fix someone else.

everything started to make sense once i learned that you don’t need to be caught underneath an ill-tempered wave in order to drown. i’m talking about how it feels when your fingers are twisted up in my long, blackwater hair, pulling just enough to hurt. pulling just enough for me to not want you to stop. - dry drowning.

i don’t mean to frighten you, but i would seriously consider drinking the atlantic whole if only you asked me to. - what wouldn’t i do for you?

i wish you had been my first love. i would have even settled for second love. - third is the worst best.

shiny gold flecks coat the tips of my fingers the first time i place them onto your skin. bringing them to my lips, i cannot help but to think that it tastes like something not of this world. carelessly, i misplace the age-old fairy lore which warns humans like me never to eat or drink anything that seems too good to be real, lest you lose yourself too completely. - my midas.

you’re the kind of intriguing that inspired thousand-page epics. - how many centuries have you lived?

finding a way to fit into your sun-kissed arms was almost excruciatingly easy. - you were always my favorite wreck.

each morning before school, my mother did not feed me breakfast. she fed me wisdom. first, she brushed my hair with a fork. soon after, braids fell to my waist as she kissed the top of my head, whispering against it, “now. don’t you dare lean out your window & let it all fall down. you never know who will show up & climbclimbclimb on up. heed my advice: even villains will go all dizzy & heart-eyed for you. do not ever become fooled by such trickery.” - mother knows best.

III. the song

“ & so she did what any rational woman would do— ever so calmly, she reached out & she tore the stars apart.

i watched

you watching me wane. now, you have

no fucking choice

other than to

watch me - become full.

becoming